Into the forest
by HarrisM12345
Summary: Ever wonder why Lily started dating James in their 7th year? Oneshot. Marauder's era.


Ever wonder what got Lily to finally start dating James in their 7th year?

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Lily strolled across Hogwart's school grounds back to the castle. She knew she wasn't supposed to be out visiting Hagrid so late at night, but she had lost track of the time, as she often did on the weekend, and didn't even notice the twilight turn to darkness. The full moon was glistening in the sky and lighting her way back to the castle. She tripped over a few rocks in the impaired light, but didn't feel the need to ruin the beauteous image with light from her wand. She was almost up the hill when she heard something howl from the forest. She could tell the animal was howling for help, and didn't even stop to think as she sprinted into the forest, that no longer scared her as it did when she was younger. She pulled out her wand, convinced that she could help whatever was in the forest and, being a 7th year student, she could take down anything that stood in her way.

The second she got into the forest, the elegant moonlight that had been leading her way across the grounds vanished.

"Lumos" she chanted. The tip of her wand lit up with a brilliant, blinding light, and for a second, she couldn't see. Though her eyes were still adjusting to the light, she continued to run towards the place where she had heard they cry.

After running for a solid five minutes, she stopped to look around for some indication of where the animal in trouble was. She suddenly heard another howl, but it wasn't the same howl she had before. She looked over her shoulder and saw a silhouette of a large animal with glowing red eyes growling at her. She froze; petrified with fear as the bloodthirsty animal began to charge at her, it's gaping jaws open wide and ready to bite. She only had a second to see what exactly was charging at her. She knew immediately from what she had learned in Defense Against the Dark Arts hat this wasn't just any wolf, but a werewolf. She tried to run, but felt stiffness spike through her legs and found herself unable to move. She stared into the eyes of the lycan and was sure she was about to face her death, when a stag burst out of nowhere just in front of the werewolf. The werewolf ran into the stag and become entangled in its great antlers, growling and swiping furiously. It landed a deep blow into the stag's right leg before the stag tossed its head and sent the werewolf flying across the air and into a tree. The stag turned to look at Lily, and she saw an almost human expression of worry and fear stricken across it's scratched face. There was a sound of crunching twigs and leaves and the two of them barely had time to look over to see the werewolf charging at Lily again. A great black dog burst out of the trees and tackled the werewolf, while the stag ran towards Lily, and with it's antlers, flung her over it's head and onto his back. He darted through the trees and out of the forest, right up to the entrance of the school, where he gently let her down. She stared into his eyes, again seeing a very personified look of relief. He nudged her closer to the school's doors, but she took a step closer to him.

"How can I ever thank you?" she asked, as she began to stroke his neck. A rat scampered down one of the stag's antlers and up Lily's arm, onto her shoulder. The stag stared at the rat and grunted. The mouse squeaked back, and Lily could have sworn that it nodded. Lily noticed that the stag was standing on only three of its legs, the front right one was darkened and drenched with blood, but before she could express any concern, it ran off with a limp back off into the forest. She thought about how much it must have hurt the stag to run so far with her extra weight on her back. She turned to look at the rat that sat obediently on her shoulder, and wondered what was causing a bunch of animals to act so human. The rat looked at her then up at the door, almost like it was telling her to go inside, so she did. She made her way up to the Gryffindor common room.

She didn't even attempt to sleep on that cold winter's, Saturday night. Instead, she sat on one of the chairs in the common room. The rat was now asleep on her lap and she scratched its head subconsciously. She couldn't stop thinking about the animals. Her head quickly filled with questions.

"_Why were they there?"_

"_Why did they help me?"_

"_Why did they seem so human?"_

Most of all, she couldn't stop thinking about the stag. She couldn't figure out why it had been so quick to endanger itself to help her, and hurt itself to get her away. She thought that she could go ask Hagrid in the morning, but she wasn't even sure if he would know.

She saw the sky start to turn from a deep blue to a warm pink, and she knew that she had been awake straight through the night. It was only a few minutes later when Lily heard the portrait of the fat lady open, and James Potter walked into the room, covered in blood and dirt.

"Sneaking out at night, Potter?" she said with a tone that was almost monotone. The rat woke up, got one look at James, then scurried out of the room. She expected him to say something to her comment, but instead, he ran over to her chair and kneeled next to her, seemingly unable to hold himself on his legs.

"Are you okay?" he asked with the most concerned tone she had ever heard in his voice. She hesitated for a second before answering, determined no to tell him what had happened in the forest.

"What are you talking about, I'm fine."

"So… so he didn't bite you?" James asked. Lily knew that he was on to her, but she decided to continue to pretend not to.

"What are you talking about?"

"The werewolf! Did he bite you?!" James yelled with more concern in his voice than anger.

"How… how do you know about that?"

"Answer the question!"

"No… No, I'm fine," she said. James sighed with relief. "But how did you know?"

"How did I know?! If I hadn't stopped him, he would have gotten to you! He could've… he could've killed you, Lily…" but before either of them could say another word, the portrait swung open again, and Sirius was helping Remus walk through the door. Remus was wearing Sirius' cloak and scarf. Remus saw Lily and limped over to her, out from under Sirius' arm.

"Lily! I'm so sorry. Sirius told me everything. Are you okay? I never would have been able to live with myself if…"

"Does that mean…you really _are_ a werewolf then." Lily asked with a tone of shock in her voice.

"Yes, I am" Remus sighed.

"Hey, where's wormtail?" Sirius asked as he sat down in front of the fire.

"Probably gone to sneak bandages from the hospital wing, he knows the drill by now."

"Right…" Sirius said, looking back into the fire. "What I wouldn't give to have my fur right about now." He said with a shiver. Lily had a look of confusion struck across her face, not exactly sure what Sirius meant about having his fur.

"Then go ahead and have it," James started. "There's no point in hiding from Lily any more." Sirius looked over at Lily, then back at James. He shrugged and right before their eyes, turned into the dog that had attacked the werewolf in the forest. Lily gaped, but James just took off his coat and put it over Sirius, who was now lying down by the fire. Sirius looked up at him with a smile, then rested his head on his floor and closed his eyes. Lily was that under his white shirt, James' right arm was covered in blood.

"Wait," she started, "If Remus was the werewolf, Sirius was the dog, and I'm assuming Peter was the rat, then you were the…" she paused and stared at his arm, which he quickly grabbed with his other hand. "The stag." Lily's face was close to James' now, and they were staring into each other's eyes.

"I'm back!" Peter said loudly as he burst into the room with his arms full of rolls of bandages. Remus was abruptly awoken from sleeping in his chair, and Sirius growled at Peter without moving or even opening his eyes. The sun was well into the sky now and they heard a few people moving around in some on the girl's dormitories. Sirius stood up and shook off James' cloak. He jerked his head towards the staircase to the boys' dormitories. Peter picked up James' cloak and he and Remus followed the black dog up the stairs. Once the three of them were just barely out of sight, James looked over to the staircase, then back to Lily. He wanted to stay with her, but knew that he would be in a lot of trouble if someone saw his covered in blood. He stood up, and surprisingly, Lily did too. He continued to look into her beautiful green eyes for another second until, without thinking, he kissed her. Surprising even herself, she kissed him back, and for a few long seconds, they were the only two people in the world. They heard footsteps, and James had to run up the other staircase, barely having time for a backwards glance before a few other girls came into the room.

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Yeah... I don't usually do Harry Potter fics, but I just read all 7 of the HP books in 6 days, so I kinda got obsessed with it...

The sad thing is, I started to be more interested with the story of the Marauders more than the story of Harry and people...

So yeah...

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Please review

Ma

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P.S. die, wormtail. DIE!


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